“What else can we do?” Strategies and negotiations around place and space in the case of “undocumented” Zimbabwean migrant workers in Botswana

Abstract

Restrictive immigration laws, enhanced border controls, the criminalisation of migrants, punitive deportation practices and a lack of respect for the right to asylum have become a common feature of the contemporary world. In the face of these increasingly restrictive state practices and intolerant local responses to migrants, rates of human mobility continue to grow and ever larger numbers of people experience daily life through an “undocumented” status. In the midst of prejudice and intolerance, those labelled “undocumented” shape their daily lives by living within but not as part of their host societies. Based on fieldwork among Zimbabwean migrant workers in Botswana, this paper examines the differential meanings they attach to borders and boundaries, the strategies they employ to negotiate daily life and the ways in which place and space are interconnected in their lives. The paper argues that undocumented migrants experience their state of existence as a dynamic, ever-changing world and a reality that is focused on negotiating the present, and that this is a normal rather than abnormal response to the context in which they live.